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On April 11-13, 2010, over 30 individuals from a range of sectors and perspectives met in Salt Lake City to provide thoughtful input on the enhancement of the national vaccine safety system. Named the “Salt Lake City Writing Group”, the meeting was convened by the Vaccine Safety Working Group (VSWG) of the National Vaccine Advisory Committee (NVAC). Invited attendees included Peter Bell, Autism Speaks’ executive vice president of programs and services, and Sallie Bernard, Autism Speaks board member and Executive Director of SafeMinds. For the purposes of this meeting, participants were asked to bring their experience and expertise to bear on this issue, but were not asked or expected to represent the official views of their organizations of affiliation.

The NVAC advises the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on issues of vaccine policy. In 2008, NVAC formed a Vaccine Safety Working Group (VSWG) with two charges: first, to review and provide comment on the Centers for Disease Control’s Immunization Safety Office’s draft Scientific Agenda; second, to review the current federal vaccine safety system. Specific to the second task, the VSWG is charged with developing a White Paper (for consideration and possible adoption by the NVAC) describing the infrastructure needs for a federal vaccine safety system.

As part of these efforts, NVAC committed to meaningful public and stakeholder engagement. For the VSWG’s second charge, that process includes both the recently concluded meeting in Salt Lake City and a meeting of a broader group of stakeholders is expected to take place in Summer 2010 in Washington, D.C.

The accompanying memorandum from the Writing Group provides some highlights of the discussion that took place on April 11-13.